Todays's Blog is from Dawn our Director of Nursing, Therapies and Quality
Hello, my name is Dawn, I am the Director of Nursing, Therapies and Quality and I am incredibly proud to say that I have been a nurse for 29 years. So where did my journey begin? Well, my dad is a retired vet and my mum a retired district nurse midwife. This meant that as children my brother and I often accompanied our parents on their daily rounds, especially during school holidays.
A significant number of the memories from my childhood are sitting in the passenger seat of my mum’s mini clubman when she was out and about on her rounds. It wasn’t unusual to wake up in the middle of the night cuddled up in a sleeping bag in the back of the car when my parents both got called out at the same time – mum to a home birth and dad to a calving or lambing. To me that was normal life so nursing got into my blood at a very early age.
However, it was not until the death of my grandma (who I absolutely adored) that I decided I wanted to become a nurse. I spent a lot of time sitting with my grandma before she died and remember the nurse offering me a bowl of ice cream and custard to feed to her but I was too scared to do this in case she choked on it. I can remember vividly the sound of her moaning at the end of her life when she was moved; she had developed a pressure ulcer.
This was my catalyst. Shortly after my grandma died I applied to do my training and was delighted to be accepted. Up until this point I had been working as a beauty consultant for a well-known cosmetic house so I turned up for my first day as a student nurse with perfect make up and long carefully manicured red nails.
I subsequently found out that my tutor had predicted I wouldn’t last long, how wrong he was! I loved my nurse training! Each and every placement opened my eyes to a different aspect of nursing. I trained in a school of nursing attached to a hospital so had a very practical grounding providing ‘hands on’ nursing in a wide range of placements including acute psychiatry, maternity, trauma and orthopaedics, theatres, recovery, ITU, CCU, acute medicine, acute surgery, A&E, paediatrics, community hospitals, district nursing, health visiting, community maternity teams and the ambulance service.
I have always been very inquisitive and took every single opportunity offered to me and never regretted one second of the additional effort I put in to see as much as I could during that time. I quickly realised that I would need a degree to compete with the relatively new breed of nurses – ‘the degree nurses’. I signed up with the Open University and began studying for my BSc (Hons) in Psychology alongside being a student nurse. Things didn’t quite go to plan and I unexpectedly fell pregnant three months after qualifying as a nurse.
However, this didn’t stop me. I spent the next few years studying for my degree, working as a nurse and by the end of my degree I had three children, having sat my final exam whilst very, very heavily pregnant with my third child. My ongoing commitment to my own education is a thread that has run through my entire career.
Nursing opened the door for me and since I qualified I have studied throughout my whole career and developing our nursing workforce remains an absolute passion. As I write this blog I have just submitted my final project to Yale University where I am undertaking a course in Global Healthcare Leadership. Once bitten by the education bug I was hooked and I suspect I may have a few more things up my sleeve yet! What is important is that throughout all my studies I have retained my love of clinical practice and have been disciplined enough to study and work at the same time.
It has been really hard road at times and often at significant personal expense (both financially and in terms of time spent away from my family, either being away on courses or squirrelled away writing essays or studying for exams). However, my career path has enabled me to work in great variety of settings.
When I first qualified I had worked in a busy orthopaedic and trauma unit and went back after maternity leave but then took a different path and worked as a community nurse. I found the acute setting and the community setting equally interesting and rewarding and have spent the rest of my career between the two! I found the fast pace of a surgical unit was enormously rewarding and satisfying.
However, when I nursed people in their own homes I discovered a totally different side of nursing. I developed long term professional relationships with my patients and their families. The bonds that were formed were close and when I lost one of patients it resonated. I remember one lady with cancer and her only wish was to spend Christmas Day with her two young children. Sadly she died on Christmas Eve; I will never, ever forget her or her family or the way I felt that Christmas Day with my three children. I have been fortunate to spend over the last 7 years to work in an integrated mental health, LD and community Trust in a number of senior roles.
The huge variety of roles within nursing means I have never been bored or stagnant, there is always something to learn or a fresh challenge ahead. Over the years I have had a number of key people who have helped me on the way and informally sponsored my career development. I have been given opportunities, been pushed and challenged, supported and stretched but have never stood still.
To this day I remain curious, engaged, excited and eternally optimistic about what we can achieve as nurses. We have an incredibly powerful voice and are central to maintaining the high quality care our patients and public expect.
I am proud of my profession; I am proud of Dorset Healthcare; I am proud that my mum was such a fantastic nurse; I am proud that my son has just completed his second year studying Adult Branch Nursing and I am proud to have been a nurse for almost 30 years. If you asked me if I made the right decision to become a nurse, I would say that I did and I would do it all over again!
https://youtu.be/2IT9GUBu-cU